To Live By

October 29, 2013

Do You Lack Attention to Detail? Keep Reading to Find Out

By Danny Rubin

There are 10 errors throughout this column. Some are factual mistakes and others are grammatical. See how well you can spot the slip-ups. Hint: all names are spelled correctly. Hopefully, this little quiz will remind us to never overlook fine details, especially on a sensitive work project.

Before health care reform even went into effect on September 1, President Obama had an army of Republican critics trying to bring it down. Remember Sen. Ted Cruz’s mammoth 21-hour speech in which he railed against Obamacare (and read Dr. Seuss)? How about the creepy Gen Y effort to encourage people our age to ‘opt out’?

With such fierce opposition,the White House had to make sure it introduced healthcare.gov, where millions of Americans would buy health insurance, without a hitch.

Well, so much for that.

Nearly a month into Obamacare, the health insurance web site is an unequivocal disaster. There are bugs, glitches, freeze-ups, lockouts and enough “while you wait” spinning wheels to send us into a hpynotic trance.

“At a time when we can do everything from ordering a pizza, flowers or airline tickets, or banking and paying bills, they expect the same reliable service from healthcare.gov – and it’s still not ready for primetime,” Rep. Fred Upton, R-Michigan, said.

Obama has said the glitches are “unacceptable,” and Treasury Secretary Jack Lew claims “there’s no one more frustrated than the president.”

Unfortunately, that may not be true. This week, Secratary of Health and Human Services Kathleen Sebelius will appear at hearings on Capitol Hill to explain the web fiasco (and fidget uncomfortably in her seat). Rep. Darrell Issa says Sebelius either needs to fix health-care.gov or resign.

5,000,000. That’s a lot of words and numbers to create an online Health Care marketplace. Quite literally, there were millions of ways it could go wrong. That’s why as projects grow in size and scope, the little things matter even more. One tiny eror could ruin the entire project, and suddenly we can become a “laughingstock” with our job in question.

The president tapped Jeff Zients, a White House economic adviser, to oversee repair efforts to healthcare.gov. Zients’ prediction: the site will be fixed at the end of November.

Oof. That’s not soon at all.

Secretary of Health and Human Services Kathleen Sebelius is having the worst week ever. Photo by US Mission in Geneva (Flickr)

Imagine if the White House had sweated the small stuff all along.. Then, government officials would have made certain healthcare.gov could seamlessly handle hundreds of thousands of people at once.

If you’re going to work hard, you might as well be smart about it. Healthcare.gov is a reminder to check, check and then re-check our work before “pushing it live.”

Sorry, Ms. Sebelius, but your in for a rough month. November 30th is no time soon.